“Sky-lights!” cried Janet; “ay, but there is, and Andrew Ireland will climb out and get to heaven, while you, you varmint, will be breaking firewood in h—to roast their honours the judges who condemned my innocent darling.”
“Quiet, Janet.”
“Well, thin, to roast yourself; will that plaise ye?”
“Yes, yes,” said I.
And fearing that the woman’s passions, inflamed by her grief, might reach the height of a howl, I moved away, while she, muttering words of wrath, proceeded after the white coffin. Nor can I say I was altogether comfortable as I proceeded to the Office, for there is something in the wild moving yet miserable lives of these Arabs of the wynds when wound up by death that is really touching. Nay, it is scarcely possible to avoid the thought that they are not free agents, if they do not claim from our sympathy the character of victims. In truth I was getting muffish, if I did not soliloquise a bit about other climbers whose feet rested on the backs of such poor wretches, and who, by means not very different, get into high places, where they join the fashionable cry about philanthropy—yes, a philanthropy that helps the devil, by allowing him to brain the objects they attempt to benefit.
But a police-office soon takes the softness out of a man. I had scarcely entered when I got notice of a robbery, committed on the prior night at the workshop of Messrs Robb and Whittens, working silversmiths in Thistle Street. On repairing to the spot, I ascertained that the robber had made off with a number of silver articles, sugar-tongs, spoons, and other valuables; among the rest a number of silver screws. I particularly notice these, because they served my purpose in quite another way than that for which they were originally intended. But as to the manner of the robbery, I could get no satisfactory information beyond the fact that a suspicion attached to two chimney-sweeps, who had been passing in the morning, and had been employed to sweep the vents of the workshop; nor was my disappointment lessened by finding that the sweeps were utterly unknown to the parties connected with the shop. They could not even tell whether they came from the new town or the old. Then as to identification, even had I been angel enough to bring so unrecognisable a creature before them, who ever heard of any distinctive features in a chimney-sweep, if he has not a hump on his back or wants a nose on his face! Even I, who have seen through all manner of disguises, am often at fault with them until I almost rub noses with them—a process in which I would catch a “devilish sight” more than I wanted.
Notwithstanding these difficulties, I did not altogether despair, insomuch as I at least became pretty well satisfied that it really was the gentlemen in black who had done the deed. So wherever there was smoke to be cured and vents sweeped, I considered it my duty to call and try if I could find, not the features of my men, but some trace of the tongs and screws; for in many cases where I have had right to search, I have got my pipe lighted at a fire, the light of which has shewn me what I wanted. Yet all wouldn’t do; nor was I a whit more lucky among the brokers and pawn-shops. Nay, although I screwed my ingenuity to the last turn, could I trace anything of the stolen silver screws. It was no go, as the lovers of slang say; and if it had not been that I was born never to know the meaning of “Give it up,” I would have renounced the pursuit of men who are beyond the landmarks of society.
Not altogether without a result, however, these vain searches. I was impressed with a curiosity about chimney-sweeps, and I never eyed one without a wish to know something about him. They had formerly interested me very little; for, to do them justice, though they have means of entering houses seldom in the power of others, and which none but fiery lovers ever think of, they have seldom qualified themselves for my attentions. They have no likings for the whitewashing processes of jails. At the same time, however, as cleanliness is next to godliness, they seldom appear in church; the grace would not pay the soap.
With this affection for the tribe still hanging about me, I was one day, a considerable period after the robbery, going along the Pleasance, in an expedition connected with the house called the Castle of Clouts, where I expected to find some remnants not left by the builder of that famous pile. I was not looking for sweeps, and yet my pipe was not out. I had been blowing some puffs, when, on turning round, I saw two of my black gentlemen standing smoking loungingly, with their backs to the wall. “Ah, some of the bright creatures of my fancy,” thought I; “yea, those aerial beings who for months have been hovering over me in my dreams, yet altogether without wings.” My first act was to put that same pipe out, my next to watch their movements. They were very busy talking to each other; but what interested me most was the curiosity with which they were contemplating some articles which one of them was shewing to the other,—nay, there seemed to be a silvery look about the things, which was the more apparent that they were a contrast to the hands that held them.
So straightway my pipe, which I had extinguished, required a light, and these curers of smoke could even produce that which they professed to banish. In a moment I was standing before them.